Executive parties are due to hold further talks with the Northern Ireland secretary on Thursday in another attempt to break the budget deadlock.
Seven months into this financial year the Northern Ireland Executive has still not agreed a budget.
Stormont ministers say the UK's devolution funding formula no longer delivers enough for them to balance their books.
The government had offered them an additional £525m this year, but they said it still left significant gaps in managing their spending pressures, particularly delivery of pay awards for public sector workers.
It is understood that the top civil servants in each Stormont department have also been invited to Thursday's discussions with Sir Chris Bryant, which are expected to involve one-to-one meetings with delegations from each of the four executive parties.
Where are the budget negotiations at?
Talks between the government and the executive parties have been taking place for several months now, but this week Finance Minister John O'Dowd warned that a "crunch point" is approaching.
On Tuesday, the executive met again with O'Dowd saying afterwards that he planned to present a series of options to his ministerial colleagues in the days ahead about a way forward.
He did not divulge what those may be, but the government has already said no to a request from the executive to allow a larger chunk of the money in the three-year offer to be spent this year, referred to as "front-loading".
O'Dowd said all ministers needed to remain focused on the task at hand and that he wanted to ensure the prospect of strike action in the health sector was avoided.
What happens in the absence of a budget?
Without an agreed budget, departments face operating on emergency spending restricted to 95% of the prior year, with warnings that funds could run out by January.
The secretary of state has also warned that a cost-of-living £100 payment cannot be made to households in Northern Ireland until an executive budget is agreed.
That came after the government announced its first budget under Andy Burnham last week, with Northern Ireland getting an additional £270m for public services as a result, of which £131m can be used this year.
Sir Chris has said that he is exploring contingency measures to allow him to pass a budget bill at Westminster, in the event that a deal cannot be reached to do so at Stormont.
What have other executive ministers said?
Deputy First Minister Emma Little-Pengelly said discussions to date had been "constructive" and that the executive was in a better position now than when O'Dowd published a draft budget for consideration back in January.
"The DUP rejected that - we knew it would decimate public services but there is still a significant gap, especially in terms of public sector pay," she said.
"I do not believe in asking for more money and not playing our part as regards to transformation of services but everyone agrees that takes time."
While Alliance's Agriculture Minister Andrew Muir said it is now "make your mind up time" for the executive.
"This needs to be resolved not in weeks or months, but days. We need to come to a final conclusion and give certainty to people who deserve proper pay but also in terms of investment in public services we need to get this done," he added.